


The Nightingale's Undoing

by darkrogue1 (Lily_Haydee_Lohdisse)



Series: Dangers in the Coach House [2]
Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: And By That I Mean, Canon Compliant, Compulsion/seducere and all that jazz, Dubious Consent, F/M, How can a burn be so intense and remain slow burn ?, M/M, Magic made him/them do it, My head-canon until proven otherwise, Nightingale's doomed love affair, Other, Porn, Thomas is in trouble with a capital T, rugby euphemism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2017-11-26
Packaged: 2019-02-07 05:21:01
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12834177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lily_Haydee_Lohdisse/pseuds/darkrogue1
Summary: Set at the end of Moon over Soho. The coach house remains outside the Folly's main protections, yet its inhabitants use it as a normal extension, lured by the promises of modern technology. Nightingale should have been more careful outside of the wards. But of course, hindsight is 20/20.Beta-read and edited by Theway





	The Nightingale's Undoing

**Author's Note:**

> When I first came upon those words, I nearly jumped out of my skin. I had just read Moon over Soho so my mind was full of its sexual atmosphere, so naturally, I read it that way.
> 
>  _The couch had been straightened and the rubbish bin emptied - I can always tell when Nightingale's been watching the rugby because he leaves the place tidier than normal._  
>  Whispers Underground page 154
> 
>  _I knew Nightingale occasionally sneaks up for illicit rugby, so it might have been him._  
>  Broken Homes page 6

That first weekend after Soho's debacle, a sense of normality was coming back to the Folly. Nightingale and Molly still watched worriedly Peter go through the motions, but the elder wizard was confident his young charge would one day overcome it. He understood grief all too well and knew one could not be expected to brush those feelings aside. Yet Peter allowed himself to mourn his lover Simone — far more healthy than the repressing Nightingale had witnessed in his days — and even if he was sad, devastated, his enthusiasm for magic still felt intact, his love of the job was untouched.  
  
Nightingale himself was physically well, still recovering but better every day. Over lunch, he had offered Peter to watch the game with him that afternoon, intending it as a distraction for his apprentice. But the young man had refused and pretended he had a previous arrangement to go out. A transparent lie. He had avoided the coach house as much as possible those last few days, finding some other place to do his paperwork. Of course, Simone had been there: to Peter the place had to be filled with bitter memories.  
  
So it was alone that Nightingale found his way to the top of the wrought iron staircase, with a weariness gained over the last few weeks. It was more mental than physical at this point though. In front of the door to the so-called tech cave, he found himself smiling at the sign Peter had put up to protect his precious electronics. "No magic on the pain of pain."  
  
Heartened, he went in, plugged the TV in, and, picking the remote, switched to the right channel and adjusted the sound. He had not yet lost the habit of doing those things first, inherited from a time when the remote control was still a distant eventuality. Satisfied with the result, he stepped back, sat down on the couch and relaxed, letting himself fall backwards against the cushions.  
  
It was then that the magic hit him. He never saw it coming.  
  
Immediately he was submerged, pulled under, drowning. It was like being washed away by the tide, had he been an ant. In that moment, overwhelmed, he distantly noticed himself gasping, his fingers opening and letting go of the remote, and then he lost the ability to form any coherent thought.  
  
He didn't know how long he'd stayed that way, a spark of consciousness tossed around by the currents, up or down, left or right, in a world of desire and hunger, of sweat and pleasure, swept between waves of clean, unadulterated arousal and rabid lust, accompanied by the roaring sound of the fire that devoured him and drowned out the faint outline of a jazz melody.  
  
_Vestigium_ , was the first thought he managed to form after a while, painfully aware of the extreme arousal of his body, wrought with shivers with each minimal involuntary shift as his clothes brushed against his preternaturally sensitive skin — torso, shoulders, arms, hips. He had lost control of his own movements, but at least that kept him breathing. Deliberately, painstakingly, he moved his hand to his crotch, desperate to free his erection straining against the cloth, the origin of a burn that was near too painful, but at the faintest touch he was overcome, and the acute pleasure of release sent him crashing back to the world of magical fire.  
  
He lost himself in the heat and the burn, the sensations and the pleasure, each rolling through him until the next came over, all the while perceiving his own body's responses through a hazy filter of cottony distance. He could not have concentrated enough to manage a _werelight_ in that state to save his life. Not that he wanted to, lest he feed the loop he was so carelessly stuck in.  
  
Again and again he felt swept away by the magic, driven by sensations with seemingly no end. He ached in phantom parts of his body that he felt were entirely foreign to his anatomy. Enjoyed the soft skin of rounded breasts in his hands. Felt penetrated by a hard shaft in a way rendered even more intimate by its impossibility. Felt his own erection wonderfully surrounded by a soft heat the like of which he thought he would never enjoy. Lost his soul to Peter's kiss while fire coursed through his veins with the rhythm of a familiar jazzy song.  
  
And all the while the magic felt like a storm against his senses. Sweet honeysuckle lavender and rose scents over burned pine wood, impossible buildings of woods, concrete and canvas, and overwhelming him, the spices and fire and joy of Peter's nascent magical signature, so light, so devoid of darkness, shade or twistedness that Nightingale was convinced that the young apprentice could not be anything but a white wizard — an ethical one.  
  
As the loops started to fade, Nightingale could start to ignore Simone's _signare_ , comforted by his own knowledge of her demise, but he could not do so with Peter. Peter; he'd been attracted to him from the start. Peter, whose charms he had been trying to ignore, repressing his own desire which now was running freely. To Peter he lost himself in a lovemaking that ended in a heartwrenching orgasm over which he could hear a soft childlike voice sing in the background.  
  
_My life a hell you're making_  
_You know I'm yours for just the taking_  
_I'd gladly surrender_  
_Myself to you, body and soul_  
  
'Peter,' murmured Nightingale in the magic, and he came to himself with the name on his lips.  
  
He was slow to get his bearings at first. He was slumped on the couch with one hand on himself and come all over his skin, his pants, his vest. His other hand still gripping tight on a cushion. He was panting and wrought but his body was his own once again and he scrambled away as fast as he could, to the far edge of the couch, outside of the magical echo's limits — lest it started again.  
  
Once there, he slowly let himself regroup and get his wits about. He was exhausted, spent in more than one way, left with an odd contented relief that belied the soft fire he could still feel in his blood. He held his trembling hands in front of him and looked at them in dismay. What a mess. Both literally and figuratively. Nightingale clenched them in anger.  
  
How angry he was! Angry at himself, for not being careful in what he knew was not a part of the Folly protected by the wards. Angry at himself for not warning Peter against Simone, for failing to see the deceptive and powerful seduction of the jazz vampire temptress. But not angry at Peter, no; in this moment how could he be? His apprentice had natural predispositions to the _seducere_ , of course he would have reached back to protect himself against a Compulsion he had not the strength to resist.  
  
Nightingale shuddered at the thought that if the powers had been differently balanced, the both of them might never have been able to stop, caught in a feedback loop of their own making. And now Nightingale himself had let himself been caught in the magic, still felt the effects of Peter's _signare_ like fire in his blood, calling to him. Now more than ever he belonged entirely to the young man. His apprentice. His apprentice he had sworn to protect and nurture. An apprentice in his second year of learning. How, if it was even possible, was he going resist this calling for a whole decade ?  
  
On the television, men were playing rugby. Nightingale could not tell if the match had just kicked off, or if it was in its second half, or the score, let alone who was winning. There was a box of tissues on the table, and he stood up on shaky legs to grab them and clean himself as best as he could.  
  
Wearily he eyed the spot behind the couch where, from the images he retained of his experience, he suspected Peter and Simone had made love on the floor. There was a spell, a tenth order one, to absorb _vestigia_ and remove all magical trace from a place. He doubted he could cast it now as he was. He wondered if he would ever have the strength to do it, to confront the _vestigium_ again and master it.  
  
There also was a simple fifth order spell, to seal magical remains and render them only accessible to someone by feeding them more magic. Nightingale thought of the warning sign on the door.  
  
He plugged the television off, quickly checked that all the other appliances were off the grid and performed the magic. Wearily he walked around the couch, checking that it had worked, and no more impression lashed out at him. Drained, he let himself fall on the couch again.  
  
How long would he be able to resist the temptation? How long until he came back to this room to masturbate to Peter, or worse, reactivate the loop?  
  
Peter, his naturally magical student.  
  
He recalled the warnings of his own masters against lying with magical creatures and fairies, how it wrapped you and left you no room for wanting anything human again. Completely wrapped in thoughts of Peter only, Nightingale found he did not care. A stray thought formed in his mind; he tried to squash it but it was too late. _If this was how a magical echo felt, how much more intense would the real thing be, wrapped in Peter's embrace, hands and lips on real skin?_  
  
Nightingale shuddered.  
  
Ten years. He reminded himself. He didn't believe he could last that long. But breaking his oath had consequences that were at best very dangerous to face yet. Dangerous for Peter as well, this early in his training, to risk interrupting his lessons.  
  
Peter. His student.  
  
Nightingale rose again and looked around the room. Dismayed at the state of the couch, he straightened it. Then he thought of Molly. He should warn her, reinforce the importance of there being absolutely no magic done in this room. Nightingale shuddered again, in a way relieved to have been the first to happen upon the loop. What if Molly had been caught in it? Nightingale eyed the tissues in the bin and found himself blushing.  
  
He emptied the trash, and before his thoughts betrayed him again, fled the room.  



End file.
